Gigli

Starring: Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez, Justin Bartha, Christopher Walken, Al Pacino, Lenny Venito
Directed by: Martin Brest
Rating: R
Genre: Comedy, Crime, Romance
2003

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: Two criminals (Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez) bond after they kidnap a mentally handicapped man (Justin Bartha).

Review:

Tim: Gigli has been called every bad name in the book. People have labeled this as "the worst movie ever made." That's ludicrous. Yes, the film is completely awful, but there's been so many worse movies than this one. The film is certainly a legendary box office bomb, and everyone involved in this production should be shamed and not allowed to forget what a terrible film this turned out to be. It's very bad, but not all-time bad.

While watching this movie, I saw bits and pieces of where the movie was trying to go. The pairing of Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez wasn't a horrible idea, except that the media and culture were saturated with the moronic "Bennifer", and people were already sick of them. That's not a good foundation upon which to build your movie.

Affleck is (not) surprisingly not very good in this movie. Mostly this comes from his atrocious dialogue that just made me cringe. I can't believe Affleck thought the words he was saying made sense, but by God, he said them in earnest. Jennifer Lopez likewise moves through the movie as if she believed her character made any sense at all. I wanted to laugh at them both as they took their parts very seriously, likely unaware of the bomb they were making. Their characters are supremely stupid. I'm not sure who thought a poser loser and a lesbian would make a good romantic pairing, but they just did not work. The whole relationship felt sad and pathetic and nothing like real life.

I feel bad for Justin Bartha because he seems to really be trying. I admit I laughed at his character more than anything, but besides occasionally overdoing it, he was mostly believable in a role that could not have been easy to play. I have no idea why Christopher Walken was in this movie. His presence is odd and short, and the movie never goes back to his character. It's like the film simply forgot he was ever in it. That was incredibly bad. The most shocking cast member is Al Pacino. Why on earth Pacino is in this film is beyond me. He plays the part far too over-the-top, and just seems out of place here. Pacino has made some questionable choices in the latter years of his life, but this might have been the worst. I honestly feel a bit ashamed for the whole cast.

There's just so much that is wrong with this film. You never want to see a combination of mentally handicapped people with lesbian suicide attempts, sawing the thumb off a corpse, or any of the other ridiculous events that take place in this film. I couldn't believe my ears during the scene where Lopez is doing yoga and they're talking about loving men verses women. If there is a more supremely stupid scene out there, I'd be surprised. The movie is just a complete and utter mess. Worst of all, the film runs on an unbelievable 121 minutes. That blows my mind, and is a bit reason why so many people hate this movie.

Although I'm not trying to be one of those screaming that this is the worst thing to ever happen to cinema, I admit that it's a pretty awful movie. It's too long, too stupid, and overall, a failure in almost every way. I'm not surprised that this pretty much ended the directorial career of Martin Brest. It's an terrible, terrible movie. As I mentioned, I wouldn't consider this all-time bad, but it sucks pretty bad.



Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating- 3



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